Conference papers

Acquisitional creativity: improving impact in deliberate organizational change

Lieke Schneijdenberg & Katrina Heijne

Of all major change efforts within organizations, 70% fail to achieve their objectives. For a large part, this is caused by the mismatch of the strategy and the work culture of the organization that undergoes the change (Kerber & Buono, 2005). To successfully implement change in organizations, it is key to match the plans to the needs and wishes of the people within the organization and gradually guide the steps of change towards the future goal. In the business community, the popularity of creativity has increased greatly. The use of creativity techniques can target participants’ motivation, readiness for change, and acquire insights on different perspectives within an organization. This paper discusses how these benefits can improve not only a design process, but also client acquisition activities.

Purpose – This paper describes the power of using creativity techniques to improve the succession rate of planned organizational change.

Design/methodology/approach – Using the research by design approach, the Discovering Desire toolkit was designed. Three iterations of the proposed design were performed. This paper presents the results of a study of how these different versions of the creative approach to a sales process were experienced by employees of a Dutch consulting firm and their clients. The concept was tested in four rounds in which the interaction was experienced by a total of 13 different participants, from both a consulting -and a non-consulting background.

Originality/value – This paper will propose an approach on how creativity techniques can be used within a sales process to improve the impact of planned organizational change. Studying the iterative design process, new insights and perspectives towards balancing the playfulness and formality of a session and balancing the leading and serving role of the facilitator arose.

Keywords – Creativity techniques, research through design, acceptance finding, client acquisition

Paper type – Academic Research Paper

Acquisitional creativity_improving impact in deliberate organizational change_Schneijdenberg_Heijne.docx